Wilma Cosmé (born 1966, San Juan, Puerto Rico) better known by her stage name SaFire, is an American singer. While she was one of the few freestyle artist to have major pop-chart success, she is considered an important part of Latin freestyle. Relatively known to the mainstream media, SaFire continues to perform all over the world and do many venues.
She has been featured in various magazines, such as Us Magazine, Billboard, Vogue,Elle and most recently in Signature Hits Magazine. Safire was the first Latina to grace the cover of Spin Magazine. She also appeared on television programs such as American Bandstand, Pat Sajak Show, Joan Rivers Show, Latin Connection, MTV International, Party Machine, PM Magazine, and Entertainment Tonight. Sa-Fire performed throughout the United States, Japan, Europe, the Caribbean, and South America. She won numerous awards, including six New York Music Awards, three Desi Awards, and an ASCAP award for writing "Thinking of You."
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Safire was born in San Juan Puerto Rico and grew up in East Harlem, New York, and began her singing career as a session vocalist.
SaFire was discovered at an audition for a Record label. Her debut single, "Don't Break My Heart" (1986), remains well regarded by freestyle-music and dance-music fans. "Let Me be the One" (1987), her follow-up single, proved to be a bigger hit than her debut. "Boy, I've Been Told," the first single off of her self-titled debut album, which was released by Mercury/PolyGram Records, crossed over to pop radio and reached #48 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The song was the #1 selling single in New York for twelve weeks, and the #1 song on the old Hot 103 radio station in 1988. The song topped the charts in all of the major radio stations throughout the world.
SaFire scored her most commercially successful hit with the ballad "Thinking of You" in 1989, which peaked at #4 on the Adult Contemporary chart and at #12 on the Billboard Hot 100. The song was translated into Spanish (as "El Recuerdo de Ti") by the singer–actor Ruben Blades. In 1989, SaFire and "Thinking of You" were featured in a public service announcement commercial for AIDS awareness. The commercial was seen on Spanish-language television networks across the United States and Latin America. She also sang the song on an episode of the 1989 revival of The Mickey Mouse Club.
Her debut self-titled album peaked at #84 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums and at #79 on the Billboard Hot 200. Other singles of hers that charted on the Billboard Hot 100 include "Gonna Make It" and "Made Up My Mind."
In 1989, she covered "I Will Survive" for the soundtrack of the film She-Devil, which incorporated a house and hip-hop element into the 1970s disco hit.
In 1991, she was featured in A Christmas Message with Mercury/PolyGram Records labelmates Vanessa L. Williams and Brian McKnight, with her rendition of "Joy to the World."
SaFire teamed up with friend and former teen heartthrob Tommy Page to form the dance group La Casa Fronted by Allan Edwards Tibbitt & Dacia Palmer. Together she and Page wrote and produced three songs that appeared on the New Faces compilation album released by Sire/Warner Bros. Records in 1993. This was not the first time SaFire and Page collaborated on a project. In 1990, they both co-wrote, produced, and sang the duet "Don't Give up on Love." The song was featured on Page's 1990 album, Paintings in my Mind.
Although Latin freestyle music waned in mainstream popularity in the early 1990s, she counteracted this by releasing "Taste the Bass" as a single from her second album, I Wasn't Born Yesterday. The song peaked at #6 on the Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The lead single, "Made up My Mind," peaked at #9 on the Hot Dance Music/Club Play, but stalled at #80 on the Billboard Hot 100.
During the mid-1990s, after an extensive hiatus, SaFire returned with a Spanish-language album, titled Atrevida. However, this first attempt with a salsa album was not promoted by the label and no one got to hear this great gem. It was poorly marketed by Sony Latino. Safire appeared on many shows like Joan Rivers, Pat Sajak, Club MTV, Party machine, Entertainment Tonight, tmz, Access Hollywood, etc., and she was the only Latina to appear on the cover of Spin magazine. She also appeared in Vogue, Us magazine, DJ time, New York Time, Elle magazine, El diaro el volcero, The Daily News and more... She won six New York music awards, one pop ASCAP award for "Thinking of You" for the most played song that year, and Three Desi awards as well. She is the Best freestyle artist of that era.
After another hiatus, SaFire announced the release of a new album, Bringing Back the Groove, in 2001. The album featured a cover of the New Edition hit "Can You Stand the Rain," featuring Cynthia. The album's second single, "Don't Break My Heart 2002," peaked at #3 on the Hot Dance Music/Club Play.
SaFire was given a lifetime achievement award at radio station WKTU's Freestyle free 4 all concert in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in 2007.
Her most recent single, "Exotique," was released online on May 6, 2009. Also that year, SaFire’s self-titled debut album, originally released in 1988, was made available as a download on iTunes. SaFire's second album, I Wasn't Born Yesterday was re-released on November 3, 2009, as a download.
Eighteen years after its initial release, the album track "I Never Heard" was posthumously covered by Michael Jackson under the title "This is It." The song was co-written by Jackson and Paul Anka in 1983 for an Anka album that was never completed, and it was later offered to SaFire. At some point, Jackson made a demo tape of the song with the same lyrics, and that tape was remixed after his death and released in October 2009 as his first posthumous single.[1]
In 2010, SaFire announced on urbanlatinoradio.com that she is currently working on a new Spanish-language pop album. New music set to be release sometime 2012.